Connections

Donation to Business School Helps Create Investment Track for Finance Students

The School of Business recently received a generous donation from an alumnus that will help improve the already stellar investment curriculum offered.

This donation will be used, in part, to create an Investment Track that students can take within the Finance Concentration.

This spring a new Hedge Fund course will be included in the Investment Track that allows students to manage a hedge fund with real money tied to it, thanks to the donation. This helps set Ithaca College apart from other schools, as the school has three undergraduate courses managing real money in three separate funds (equity, fixed income, and hedge). In these courses, student teams analyze data and make presentations to other students who make purchase and sell decisions.

“We are very excited and grateful to have received this generous gift from an alumnus with the vision to build out this track and help our finance students get ahead of the curve when they enter the professional world.” said School of Business Dean Mary Ellen Zuckerman.

Investment students have the opportunity to study and practice their craft in a state of the art Center for Trading and Analysis of Financial Instruments, or “trading room.” Ithaca College is one of the few undergraduate institutions in the world where the ticker runs on real time, with access to the same full spectrum of data available to professionals on Wall Street (in the global financial markets). The trading room features 12 Bloomberg terminals equipped with Bloomberg software, as well as fifty-three workstations with real-time Thomson One investment management software. Additional software includes; Thomson Data Stream, Baseline, Closed- End Funds and ETFs, Russell Investments, Palisade Decision Tools Suite, Value Line and Morningstar.

“Our Trading Room has an atmosphere conducive to shared-learning; it has immersed students in the real world of financial markets together with their complex financial instruments. Through the operations of the Trading Room, not only curricular, learning and teaching systemic changes have been implemented to narrow the gap between academic prescriptions and practitioner needs, but also student-managed real investment activities have been created and expanded. There is a high level of self-motivated learning and sharing the excitement of learning in the Trading Room that foster group dynamic of mutual curiosity embraced by civility.” says Professor Abraham Mulugetta.

Investment courses in this track will include, Security Analysis and Portfolio Management, Speculative Markets, Real-Time Portfolio Management I and II (Equity), Real-Time Fixed Income Investment and Hedge Fund I and II.

Students from other schools also have the opportunity to join the Core Trading Consultants (CTCs), who are members of a student-run finance club that manage the trading room, help train others students, and manage a real portfolio. Students get both hands-on experience and strong leadership opportunities.

Engaged Investment Advisory Board and alumni who are active in the investment field advise about the curriculum, provide feedback twice a year on student presentations about their portfolios, and mentor students with respect to internships and jobs.

The School of Business also takes an annual meet-the-firms trip to New York City to visit finance firms and interact with alumni. Companies recently hosting site visits include; Goldman, Sacks & Co., Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan, Blue Ridge Capital and IRON Financial.

The donation will also create a scholarship which starts in fall 2013. Plans for this are still being finalized.